There were twitter reports last night that he was banned for 1yr for betting.

stat card from last night:



the usual suspects with heavy minuses. vlasic with a game to forget.

regardless of coach or forecheck system, club is not built for forechecking. should concentrate on the neutral zone/stand up at own blue line and gain entries from subsequent rushes. possession in o-zone solely on passing/movement. cycling the puck after gaining possession in the o-zone isn't the answer either. 99 times out of 100, will lose possession from a failed cycle. wingers are too small, slow (murphy, brodie, martinez) defensemen hesitant to pinch and usually on the back foot, not front foot. some d-men may be on their backhand with pucks coming up the wall to the blue line.

this club's roster and current/future talents are smallish, should try to imitate the minnesota wild style of play. quick passing and movement. key is moving off the puck. find open ice.

seems as though oiler G skinner has righted his own personal ship - with basically the same save % as mrazek.

avalanche had enough of georgiev (brutal .874 save %)- cut bait, and have stabilized their G situation with recent additions blackwood and wedgewood.

really don't see any potential trade partner with the blackhawks for mrazek, other than edmonton or maybe the penguins, and that's only if skinner's form starts dipping. can't blame GM kyle for not selling high, likely no hot suitors for mrazek, when mrazek was playing lights out. i don't want to give up on soderblom, yet...he may be the only G wanted by playoff clubs not excited with their goaltending. the soft goal allowed yesterday, won't help soderblom's demand either.

The D is worse with Jones. I hope they can pawn him off on a “contender”.

I don't care how much he is getting paid and how long he is under contract, they have got to keep Jones from dressing for games. The team has been a steaming pile of dog shit since his return. His effort has been piss poor and his decision making is even worse. If he wasn't trying to hand it to the Stars behind his own net on the PP, he was putting up the not interested sign all night anytime there was an opportunity for a puck battle in the D zone.

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That's my purse! I don't know you!

watched more of the same nonsense, after 5-1, tuned out.

reading/listening to some chicago media tonight and they're fairly critical of certain individuals. i feel as though nazar is getting piled on for the 3rd goal. 3 seconds before he missed his mark/check in goal-scorer dadanov, seth jones at 6'4, 220 lbs decided to have a stick fight, inside the blackhawks blue-line and lost the stick fight and the puck got to dadanov. didn't put his mitts in the chest of the star, decided to have a stick fight, that he would predictably lose. jones did lose the stick fight. that player sent the pass over to dadanov, yet, nazar is guilty of a felony, i guess.

we all remember duncan keith, the master of the stickcheck. he had to, was small. relied on positioning and stickchecking. at 6'4, 220 lbs., what is jones' excuse?

the 4-1, 10 seconds into the 3rd period. bedard, surprise, loses the opening face-off and jones had a weak stick...nevermind. the same guys piling on brodie and nazar for goal #3, are the same guys not talking about donato, and how he's quickly reverting back to being a 9 minute a game/4th line player. donato still getting time on the #1 PP.

lots of issues and up and down the roster. i said korchinski was playing his way back to a west-bound trip on the 90. korchinski got sent down. no surprise. just too, way too soft. needs to dedicate himself to defense. this is the darkest, because we've seen lots of bedard and korchinski and bits and pieces from nazar and kaiser and allen and crevier...and guess what? a 'jury is still out' would be a win here. none has surpassed my personal/others' expectations for this stage of their respective careers. the young D have a curve, you start losing hope when they incessantly make the same mistakes.

on pace for getting embarrassed on national tv, once again. coach anders saving mrazek for the blues. ok.

yeah, noticed that too. all that is only confirmation of what we already know. appears the young D are picking up very bad habits from his ilk, the 'wise old defender' ilk. i know it sucks and you have to make a physical effort, but sometimes it's better to take the body and not attempt a stickcheck. i know kevin dean is well-respected, if i'm GM kyle, i'm telling him personally that a lot of stuff going on with the D, is absolutely unacceptable. let me know if there's push-back, and we'll send whomever to rockford, put to waivers or trade. get this garbage off the roster.

i have also noticed a movement to eliminate the time-tested scouting phrase/attribute scale of 'hockey IQ', in favor of 'hockey-sense'. ok.

He appears to be too slight of frame to play any sort of physical game. Isn't the question whether he can be a Lane Hutson-type defenseman? Meaning he is not going to out-physical anyone and you have to hope his offense makes up for it.

I've lost track of the goals, but is that the one where Nazar veered towards the middle of the ice instead of keeping with the scorer as he entered the zone? Granted the D man, whoever it was, was out of position in front (as usual), but I thought Nazar was supposed to stay with that man when entering the zone as there appeared to be no one else for him to cover.

Yeah, Jones and Murphy remain waste of roster spots.

he's fairly bigger than hutson, but your point is correct and taken. i'm not asking him to be scott stevens, but needs to be much more stronger with and on his stick and his positioning is still an issue. whether gap control, rotating checking/picking up the passer/shooter behind/in front of the net (check zone and net zone). checking could be something as subtle as a push on the body, a lift of the stick or a successful poke of the puck.

just reread a scouting report on him:



there is no doubt that he will be at the very least, a decent rushing d-man. he ticks all the physical attributes, still lacks at nhl level the attacking/skill attributes of offensive reads and some puck handling issues. will improve, i have no doubt. his skating is phenomenal, should be able to alleviate pressure in the hawk d-zone by skating the puck out. not yet...

anyways, hutson was taken some 55 players after korchinski and he already looks like quinn hughes 2.0. korchinski with zero points in 9 games this year, hutson at 26 points. canadiens and hutson out to a lead over the blackhawks and korchinski.

yes, i watched the goal some 3-4 times and watched jones lose his stick fight 3-4 times with the eventual passer to dadanov. yes, the goal scorer was nazar's man...never should have gotten to that. nazar is paid for offense, not defense. jones? well, i'd assume paid for defense...

agree about the 2 vets. blackhawks have apprx. $14 million a year tied up in those 2. add brodie's money, comes to almost $18 million total, apprx. 20% of the club's nhl salary cap on these 3 stiffs. unbelievable.

yeah, i think and hope that the nhl is trending to this reality due to negotiated minimum increases of the salary cap. believe it may go up again, some 4%-5% after this season and maybe the same the year after. at age 31, closing in on 32: his salary of $9.5 million per, may be 1/10 of the total salary cap for every club. some top club may have a d-man with a serious injury.

Of course, the Hawks will have to eat half of that but it should be doable for both the Hawks and the team taking him on. He had some value at 4.75M.

Nice to see world's oldest 54-year-old Jeremy Roenick out there today.

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Murphy and Jones, yikes! Although no one has played well today.

this guy must think humans can't retain and remember.

nhl came out with the list and no murphy and kruger. he says: "no surprises here".



i was surprised. you told me that murphy and kruger would be on the list. they weren't.

eiserman (with hutson's D brother) and team usa beat canada yesterday, 4-1. brought up eiserman for a reason. that reason is that i'm sensing some of the media is adjusting their rangefinders and guns and may start focusing in on GM kyle. heard some of it from zawaski and tirabassi (more so from mario). both in agreement that brodie was a not so good signing, 2 years, even worse. zawaski with some interesting algebra - as in the other individual FAs were ok/incomplete signings, but, they are poor as a collective.

i think the poor part has always been there for this club. guys like jones and murphy. the scary part is that only vlasic has been developed and exceeding expectations and looks a great fit. korchinski and kaiser have disappointed this season, while allen and crevier are where the other D-men were last year. allen was impressive for a rookie, has come down to earth the past few weeks.

believe nazar will start picking up points sooner than later. the truth is him, bedard, lardis are small, almost too small. kurashev is soft and moody, reichel is soft.

as far as eiserman. GM kyle went for the reach, the project that is big C boisvert, instead of eiserman. willing to give him the benefit of the doubt on this one.

I'd put Bolland ahead of DeBrincat. A bunch of points that didn't amount to diddly shit.

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yeah, just a practice in points and scoring. no real C on that all galaxy, all-world, first quarter of the 21st century team, 2nd team.

No one should be surprised that the Hawks are dogshit. Brodie was cooked last year in Toronto. That 2-year deal was an overpay the second it was signed. Martinez isn't that much better but they should be able to get a mid round pick trading him at the deadline. Mrazek isn't worth trading. Goalies don't return much in trades and the Hawks don't want to use a retention slot for him. And trading Seth Jones is not going to happen. He's just overpaid a couple million and that doesn't matter for this team.

I do agree with NWSider about the Boisvert pick. That was a little bit of a reach and while he has had a decent start in college he will always be compared to Eiserman, Connelly, and the player I liked the most at #19 and that is Michael Hage. It's also fair to compare Moore with Perreault who I definitely think the Hawks should have drafted but you knew KD would take Moore because of his skating. I wouldn't gnash my teeth over this current squad. Bedard, Vlasic, and Nazar are the only players in Chicago that matter. The most important thing is that the Hawks prospects (Levshunov, Moore, Boisvert, Rinzel, and their collection of later picks) continue to develop. Plus, they have to make sure they get a top 4 pick this year. There's 3 elite forwards and an all-around dman that have separated themselves from the rest of the draft-eligible prospects.

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Lay off that whiskey and let that cocaine be.

heard GM kyle on elliotte freidman's podcast...proving he's as much as a chicagoan as richard j daley and jean baptiste pointe du sable; said he went to the cubs 2016 parade on 'lake shore AVE'.

ok. even nanook from the north, may know it's lake shore drive - if he had a transistor radio and heard the early 70's song. c'mon kyle from chicago.

Shades of Mancow and "North Street" (though I will say that for a grid city, Chicago does play fast and loose with what's a street and what's an avenue).

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for sure...but i'm not seeing anything resembling stable progress in 2024-25 with korchinski or kaiser. allen has played fairly well, has regressed lately. let's be realistic here, KK was the #7 pick in 2022? he's got to be better, along with nazar, selected 6 spots later.

eventually, one of plante/dean(unlikey)/king will get launched if this general malaise lingers on and on. here are some others that may feel some pressure:



perreault is the wizard of face-offery.

colton dach called up from rockford, stiff anderson sent down. with nazar and dach up, not sure where rockford will find goals. more reichel talk, that i'm not interested in anymore. under contract for one more season at a decent $1.2 million. play one more year, don't take any chances and get injured and maybe you'll be reunited with kurashev in switzerland.

not sure what the message is here; nhl out of towners who watched the blackhawks practice end without 5 goals scored on mrazek after 30 minutes....shaking their collective heads. i mean. why doesn't mrazek do that to the opposition?

luckily for kyle, no avenue of the americas in chicago. expected a bit more from him, considering he drove back from michigan/hockey tournie the night of the cubs game 7 win.

when i was a kid, north avenue was considered some kind of border. lots of map-makers in the city.

no murphy, no worries. young d was good. thought crevier was weakest link of the youngsters and jones, just getting by. soderblom very good - these guys need to make a decision about the G situation.

good for maroon scoring after getting pummeled. caufield is a mirror image of bedard and right now, his shots go in, bedard's don't. caufield is making under $5 million, bedard' accountants/financial planner/tax attorney may have to adjust future expectations.

BN guy leading the cheers for the 11 year old fans who have been lead to believe that 'C' foligno is a borderline all-star:




yes, captain foligno, your actions speak louder than words. you are a leader. when foligno goes 6 games without a point, won't hear anything from BN. foligno did get a lot of fucking luck yesterday - kaiser with the perfect slap pass and vlasic unlucky, that his shot didn't stay in. foligno just standing around in front of the net, 2 goals and a nice write-up. life is good.

Agreed, Nolan, Kaiser were good. Crevier, not so much.

Hawks have no serious face punchers. Good thing that fighting isn’t much of a thing these days. But I will say that yesterday’s game was fun to watch. More of an old style game.

Caufield reminds me more of Debrincat than Bedard. Need some actual players to put on a line with Bedard.

And I think that Dach had a nice game in his debut. Physical, was around the front of the net. I’d like to see more of what he can do.

How long until he gets hurt?